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Friday, November 21, 2014

Vatican City, 21 November 2014 (VIS) –
Pope Francis has sent a video message to the participants in the
fourth edition of the Festival of the Social Doctrine of the Church,
which this year focuses on the theme, “Beyond places, in time”.
The title, he says, suggests various points for reflection, the first
of which is the concept of “going beyond”. “The current
situation of social and economic crisis can frighten us, disorientate
us or seem so difficult that we conclude there is nothing we can do.
The great temptation is to stop and tend to our own wounds, and find
in that an excuse not to listen to the cry of the poor and the
suffering of those who have lost the dignity of being able to put
bread on the table because they have lost their jobs. And those who
seek only to cure their own wounds end up preening themselves. This
is a trap. The risk is that indifference makes us blind, deaf and
mute, present only to ourselves, before the mirror, so that
everything happens outside us. Men and women closed up in
themselves”. This narcissism, he says, is not the right approach.

“We are required to go beyond this
and to respond to real needs”, he continues. “To go overcome, it
is necessary to take the initiative. … Nowadays, even in the
economic sphere it is urgent to take the initiative, as the system
tends to sanction everything and money takes control. The system
leads to this form of globalisation which is not good and which
sanctions everything. … Taking the initiative in these spheres
means having the courage not to let oneself be imprisoned by money
and short-term gains which enslave us. We need to find a new way of
seeing things!”

“The real problem is not money
though, but rather people: we cannot ask of money that which only
people can do or create. Money alone does not lead to development:
development requires people who have the courage to take initiative.
And taking the initiative means developing activity capable of
innovation, not only of a technological nature; it is also necessary
to renew working relations, experimenting with new forms of
participation and responsibility for workers, inventing new ways of
entering the world of work, creating a bond of solidarity between
business and territory. Taking initiative means overcoming
'assistentialism'”.

“Taking initiative also means
considering love as the true motor of change”, he adds. “Freeing
talents is the beginning of change; this action allows envy,
jealousy, rivalry, disagreement and prejudice, and opening up to joy,
to the joy of the new”. He emphasises that the question of talent
is of particular relevance to the young: “If we want to go ahead,
we must make decisive investments in them and trust in them”.

“'Going beyond places' is not the
result of individual chance but of sharing an aim: history is a path
towards fulfilment. If we act as a population, if we go ahead
together, our existence will illustrate this meaning and this
fullness”.